Book Review: Imagine by Jonah Lehrer

Title: Imagine: How Creativity Works
Author: Jonah Lehrer
Enjoyment Rating: ****
Source: Audible for iPhone
Books I've read this year: 61

When I was in college, my roommate Leslie and I had a plan. We would graduate, get jobs, get married, and then somehow convince our husbands to settle not just in the same city, but in a communal living situation. Then we'd invite our friends to buy the houses around ours, and we'd all live in a happy state of shared domesticity. The idea wasn't that weird to me; when I was a kid my parents and their best friends shared a condo for several years, but we've never been able to convince the husbands to make a go of it. However, when we get together, Leslie and I always get a glimpse of what our lives would be like if we lived together. Our boys play, my middle daughter makes plans to marry her son, and we get involved in some kind of creative pursuit. Sometimes we paint (she's an artist), sometimes we come up with ideas for essays, sometimes we delve into a decorating project or put together a feast. Whatever we do, I feel like there's some kind of synergy at work-- together the two of us are more-- more interesting, more creative, just more than we are by ourselves.

In his book Imagine, Lehrer talks about how creativity often comes in surprising ways, and he validates the idea that Leslie and I may have been onto something. His chapters focus on how inspiration can come when the mind takes a rest (why those Silicon Valley companies have ping pong tables, for example), how some of the best ideas come from novices, how collaboration works (and brainstorming doesn't)-- this chapter has a fascinating view of Pixar, why cities produce more patents and more good ideas than more rural locations, and how to live a creative life, not just experience spurts of creativity.

I have a weakness for Jonah Lehrer. I've read his other books, and when Jad and Robert say that they'll be speaking with Jonah Lehrer on Radiolab, it always gets my heart beating. Dare I say I have a literary crush on Lehrer, whose work makes neuroscience accessible to the masses? Imagine was no different. I listened to it eagerly, and I was sad when Lehrer came to the end of the story.

Book Review: Confessions of a Scary Mommy by Jill Smokler

Title: Confessions of a Scary Mommy: An Honest and Irreverent Look at Motherhood-- the Good, the Bad, and the Scary
Author: Jill Smokler
Enjoyment Rating: **
Source: Ordered new from Amazon
Books I've read this year: 60

I'm not sure where I came across this book. In fact, I think I might have thought I was ordering that book about why French moms are better than American moms. Regardless, once I got the book in my hands, I was a little bit disappointed. Jill Smokler is a blogger with a book deal, who managed to parlay decent writing skills, a shtick, and a personality that doesn't fear putting herself out there into not only a successful blog, but also a book deal.

Unfortunately, for someone who has been reading "confessional mommy blogs" for nearly a decade, this book didn't feel all that interesting or fresh. Sure, there were times when I laughed out loud, and I do appreciate knowing that there are other moms out there who secretly think one of their kids is cuter than the others or whose favorite time of day is bedtime (incidentally, the only reason I'm writing this post is because it's naptime, another favorite time of day), but I think I've gotten to the point as a reader that this shared camaraderie isn't enough-- the story needs to go deeper than "I hate my kids for giving me stretch marks-- even though I love them." I think that the book will appeal to fans of Smokler's blog, who have been reading her stuff for free for many years, but I'm not sure it will convert lots of new followers. 

Blessings and bruises

Last year, when Ed and I were in the early stages of our adoption, one of the reasons that the China program looked so attractive is that our relationship with our baby's birth family would be very cut and dried. There would be no relationship. The vast majority of kids who are adopted from Chinese orphanages are abandoned, and after no one comes calling for them for a period of time (they even put finding ads in the newspapers) they are determined to be the equivalent of wards of the state. It seemed like things would be simpler if our baby didn't have birth parents who could call us or who might decide to change their minds; I'd seen too many friends, potential adoptive parents, who had gone through the agonies of waiting for babies only to come home empty-handed after those babies were born. I wasn't sure my heart could take that kind of pain.

On Saturday we gave Rose a name and a blessing. Ed held her in a circle of uncles and a grandpa and our bishop while he welcomed her to our family and talked about all of the things he hopes she will achieve in life, just like he's done for our four other kids. She even wore the same dress all of the other kids wore. And when we said "Amen," Rose looked up at her daddy and clapped her hands, a giant smile on her face. She seems perfectly content to be part of our family.

Then, on Monday, we took her to the hospital, where a group of surgeons repaired her lip, tacked her soft palate together for a future repair, and inserted a prosthetic hard palate and ear tubes. I spent a few nervous hours waiting with my mom and two dear friends who dropped by. And then it was over-- she was fixed. No more gap above her lip. No more formula coming out of her nose and boogers coming out of her mouth. She was bruised and swollen and sore, but also whole.

That night, we were carefully attended by a nurse who came to check vitals late in the night and told me that three years earlier she had placed a baby girl for adoption. "It's worked out really well," she said. "My family and I see her all the time; we've even gone on vacation together."

And now I wonder if I had it all wrong. Because there's nothing I want more than to tell Rose's birth parents that she's fine. Her lip is fixed. Her palate works the way a palate should. Rose thrived this year, despite all of the obstacles in her way. She's beautiful and curious and strong-- everything anyone could want from a child. And I'm so blessed that she's mine. But I wish I could give them a glimpse of how the baby girl they created and bore is turning out. It would surely heal their hearts more than it would render mine vulnerable. Because she's such a joy-- she's the best gift I've ever been given, and I have them to thank for it.

2011 Whitney Recap

(originally posted at Segullah)

It's been a little more than two months, and we've been hard at work reading the finalists for the 2011 Whitney Awards, which honors novels written by LDS authors. Angela, Emily M, Jessie, Melonie, Rosalyn, and I have spent the last couple of months discovering new voices, cheering for old favorites, and occasionally wishing we could throw our Kindles against the wall. But now we're emerging, pale and myopic, from our reading cocoons, and we'd like to share what we've found with you as we submit our ballots to the Whitney Awards Committee. Jessie, Rosalyn, and I all blogged about some of what we read on our blogs.

We could go on and on about how the overall quality of the books has improved in the years we've been reading the finalists (it has) or about how frustrated we were with some of the ways books were categorized (fodder for other posts), but we're just going to cut to the chase and tell you how we voted. We were instructed to rank all five of the finalists in each of the seven categories. Then we had to vote for our favorite book by a new author and our favorite book of the year. So without further ado...

General: Before I Say Goodbye by Rachel Ann Nunes. Nunes's book, about a woman with terminal cancer who returns to Utah County with her two children, hoping to get them settled before she has to leave them, was our pick this year. Nunes seems to have her finger on the pulse of what her audience wants to read, and she did a nice job weaving together the multiple points of view.

Historical: Emily, Jessie, and I were all fans of Gale Sears's Letters in the Jade Dragon Box, a story about a young girl coming to terms with her relationship with her parents (who sent her to live with an uncle in Hong Kong during a period of unrest in her native China) against the backdrop of the establishment of the LDS Church in Hong Kong. While the main narrative felt more like a YA novel than a historical novel at times, we nonetheless enjoyed the interesting subject matter and the characters Sears created.

Romance: When I started reading the Whitney finalists three years ago, I was anti-Romance. But reading the finalists has converted me. In fact, we had a really hard time picking a book in this category because so many of them were so strong. Ultimately, our first-place vote went for seasoned novelist Carla Kelly's Borrowed Light (after a protracted conversation about whether the book was, in fact, a historical novel rather than a historical romance), the story of a young woman who flees her boring fiance in Salt Lake in the early 1900s and goes to Wyoming to cook on a ranch. While in Wyoming, she not only finds love, but also finds her own devotion to her faith rather than relying on the faith of her parents and community. But the best surprise of 2011 came in the form of Melanie Jacobson, whose two Romance novels, Not My Type and The List, showed that she really understands how her young protagonists talk and act, and that she's willing to explore some of the trickier aspects of Mormon culture. I know I'm really looking forward to her finalist next year, because I don't doubt that her next book will also be a finalist.

Mystery/Suspense: This was another tricky category for us as readers because we felt that we were comparing apples and oranges. Some of the books were straightforward mysteries, while others were Dan Brown-type suspense novels. We had a really hard time coming to a consensus here. Since the ballot was emailed to me, I ended up putting my favorite novel in the category, Anne Perry's Acceptable Loss, as the first choice. But one of the readers in our group found the subject matter (which involved child sex abuse) so disgusting that she didn't finish the book. Then we found ourselves divided among the other books in the category. I also liked Stephanie Black's Rearview Mirror, which had interesting, complicated characters.

Speculative: We've liked Dan Wells's John Wayne Cleaver books every year, so it should come as no surprise that we were big fans of the final book (or is it?) in the trilogy, I Don't Want to Kill You which brought the events in the three novels to a satisfying, horrifying, somehow exactly perfect conclusion. However, Wells managed to wow us again with his quirky, zany, weird The Night of Blacker Darkness, a Vampire novel featuring John Keats and Mary Shelley as main characters.

Youth Fiction- Speculative: In this very strong category (I could see any of the five books winning the award), Rosalyn and I were completely charmed by Jessica Day George's Tuesdays at the Castle. We loved Princess Celie and how she manipulated her magic castle to save her family and her kingdom. We were also big fans of how Bethany Wiggins modernized the Navajo Skinwalkers legend in Shifting, and, to be honest, every other book in this category.

Youth Fiction- General: It's a good problem when all of the books in the category are strong, isn't it? We found that challenge again in the Youth Fiction- General category. We particularly liked Tess Hilmo's sweet Southern coming-of-age story With a Name Like Love, but I was a huge fan of Kristen Chandler's Birds Don't Fly, and we also liked Sean Griswold's Head.

We were very happy to be able to rank books in the last two categories (Best Novel by a New Author and Novel of the Year) rather than picking a single book.

Best Novel by a New Author: We loved Tess Hilmo's With a Name Like Love, and we also loved Melanie Jacobson's The List. In fact, we liked both so much that we're reluctant to disclose which one got our top pick.

Novel of the Year: Once again, we found it hard to pick just one book, so we were glad we could rank our top ten. We were such big fans of Borrowed Light, With a Name Like Love, I Don't Want to Kill You, Tuesdays at the Castle, and both of the Jacobson books. Which one got our top vote? We're not telling. Which one will win? We'll all have to wait until May 5th to find out.

If you'd like to attend the May 5th awards gala at the Provo Marriott, you can purchase your tickets here. You'll get to see many of your favorite authors (maybe they'll even sign your iPad!), and might even get to rub elbows with a few of your favorite bloggers!

Book Review: A Royal Pain by Rhys Bowen

Title: A Royal Pain (A Royal Spyness Mystery)
Author: Rhys Bowen
Enjoyment Rating: ***
Source: Audible for iPhone
Books I've read this year: 59

First of all, you may have noticed something different about the heading of my reviews. I've decided to switch from 1-10/10 system to a *-**** system. I'm a grade grubber, and the number out of ten system makes me feel like I'm failing someone when I give them anything less than a six, and I think it's artificially inflating some of my ratings. So I've decided to switch over to the system used by Goodreads and basically everyone else. One star means it was awful. Two means it was ok. Three means it was good. Four means it was very good. And five means it was amazing and life changing and all that good stuff. So a three-star book is a good book. And A Royal Pain was a solid three for me.

In the second Royal Spyness Mystery, Lady Georgie is still in London in the spring of 1933, still trying to make a living cleaning houses without letting the Queen find out, still looking for a suitable wealthy man to marry, and still getting herself into lots of trouble. A Royal Pain opens with the Queen asking Georgie to house a visiting Bavarian princess, Honey, in hopes that her errant son David will fall in love with Honey and leave that detestable Wallis Simpson alone. However, as soon as Honey arrives, people start turning up dead. First there's an accident at a party, then they stumble over a body in a bookshop, then Honey's guardian dies of a heart attack. The Queen gives Georgie the added responsibility of trying to find out if the deaths are suspicious or related, all while entertaining the boy-crazy princess.

I feel a little bit guilty for liking the Royal Spyness mysteries. They are very light and fun, and also a little predictable. They don't feel like real life, at least not like mine, which I think is part of the allure. They're perfect to listen to while cleaning the house or doing laundry-- Georgie has such an engaging voice (I don't mean that literally, although the reading is fine, I just think she expresses herself in an interesting way). I'll probably keep downloading these books for when I need a break from the heavier stuff.

Book Review: Miss Delacourt Has Her Day by Heidi Ashworth (Whitney Finalist)

Title: Miss Delacourt Has Her Day
Author: Heidi Ashworth
Enjoyment Rating: 6/10
Referral: Whitney Finalist
Source: Library Copy (but this book was really hard to get-- no electronic copy provided, and the book was $25 at Amazon; the library copy came in at the very last minute)
Books I've read this year: 58

Miss Delacourt Has Her Day is Heidi Ashworth's sequel to the 2009 novel Miss Delacourt Speaks Her Mind, in which Ginerva Delacourt, the daughter of an English clergyman, and Sir Anthony, her distant cousin, get waylaid by highwaymen and once they get over their initial revulsion for each other, fall madly in love. When the second novel opens, the couple is just about to announce their engagement, but due to his cousin's recent death, Sir Anthony finds himself in line to become a duke, and the current duke has reservations about the relationship and wonders if the couple is a suitable match. In Miss Delacourt Has Her Day, Ginny and Sir Anthony go through a series of misunderstandings and miscommunications (and letters thrown in haste into figgy pudding, and lots and lots and LOTS of descriptions of what everyone is wearing) before they can find their way to wedded bliss.

I think that this is a case where not reading the first book does readers a disservice, because initially I though that both Ginny and Sir Anthony were despicable-- mostly because they weren't very nice to their servants or the other people around them. Then I went back and read about the first book and realized that they were both intended to be feisty, not jerky, and that helped me as a reader. I also think that I didn't care enough about their relationship because I didn't see it blossom. So I think this book works well for people who loved the first book and want to see them brought to the altar (spoiler-- there is no altar in the second book, ha ha!), but not as well for new readers.

Finally, and I know that this is not Ashworth's fault, but Miss Delacourt Has Her Day isn't historical fiction as I define historical fiction. It's a romance novel. It would probably be considered a "Regency Romance" but it's definitely a romance, and is published by Avalon Romance, which seems to be a pretty good clue. For a book to be historical fiction, I think it has to either include historical figures (like "real" people) or else it has to be against the backdrop of historical events. And this book isn't and doesn't. While I think it would have been a decent contender in romance, I think the book was done a disservice by putting it in with the historical fiction.

And that's it, folks! I'm done! 35 for 35! I have a big long list of books I'm going to read next-- just because I WANT to read them. I feel so free!

On Sunday we will post a wrap-up of the Whitneys at Segullah. I may post my own wrap-up here too, depending on how much the marathon, the social worker, and the baby blessing take it out of me tomorrow.

Book Review: I Don't Want to Kill You by Dan Wells (Whitney Finalist)

Title: I Don't Want to Kill You
Author: Dan Wells
Enjoyment Rating: 8/10
Referral: Whitney Finalist
Source: Personal copy, purchased with the intent to read it last year
Books I've read this year: 57

I'm coming into the home stretch with the Whitney books. I'd planned to read I Don't Want to Kill You as my last book, sort of a reward for finishing the whole thing, and while a library hold that took more than two months thwarted that plan, it was incredibly satisfying to (almost) finish out the Whitneys by finishing out the story of John Cleaver. The first year I read the Whitney finalists was the year I am Not a Serial Killer was a finalist, and that book made a huge impression on me. For the most part, it was a fantastic book-- albeit a little more gory than I was expecting and a lot more supernatural than I was anticipating until the end. Mr. Monster was also a rewarding read, although it was definitely the middle book of a trilogy, and those poor middle books always have issues just by nature of their place in things. But I Don't Want to Kill You is Dan Wells at his finest-- he hit his stride with this one. We know John Wayne Cleaver, and love him despite his sociopathic tendencies, we understand the world he inhabits, and we know that no matter what else we see in the novel, Cleaver's small North Dakota town will see lots and lots of deaths.

For a guy who doesn't understand girls and has the unfortunate habit of fantasizing about seeing them dead on his embalming table (he and his mom run the town mortuary), John certainly gets a lot of action in I Don't Want to Kill You, where he tries to track a serial killer, beckons the demon he spoke with to come find him, and has to cope with the fact that a rash of suicides has erupted among his high school peers. He's also juggling a new, hot girlfriend while holding out a torch for Brooke, who got tortured alongside him in Mr. Monster and is now keeping her distance. One of the most consistent parts of the John Cleaver stories thus far has been the way his family (his aunt, his sister, and particularly his mother) work together to prevent John from giving into his tendencies (he doesn't want to become Dexter, if he can help it), and the aunt and sister are largely absent from I Don't Want to Kill You. However, John's mother's role is as supportive as ever, and she plays a large part in the surprising (but if you look at the arc of the three stories it seems inevitable) conclusion. A thoroughly rewarding finish to the Awards readings.

Book Review: Elegy for Eddie by Jacqueline Winspear (Maisie Dobbs #9)

Title: Elegy for Eddie
Author: Jacqueline Winspear
Enjoyment Rating: 8/10
Referral: I've read all of them!
Source: Audible for iPhone
Books I've read this year: 55

Over the nine books in the Maisie Dobbs series, there are times when I want to cheer Maisie on (she can make such big breakthroughs!) and times when I want to shake her and tell her to get over herself (she can be so dense sometimes!). In most of this book, I felt like shaking Maisie, but towards the end, I think I may have started to cheer for her a little bit.


In Elegy for Eddie, Maisie has to figure out if a suspicious death (which turns into a series of suspicious deaths) in a printing establishment in her old stomping grounds on the east end is a murder or just an accident. Along the way, Maisie gains some insight into the large conflicts on the horizon (the novel takes place in 1933, and instead of hearkening back to WWI, like most of her the previous novels in the series, this one is definitely setting up for the conflicts of WWII).

The story of Eddie is almost incidental to Maisie's navel gazing in this novel. The mysteries often mirror the psychological drama Maisie endures, and I guess that's true in this story, since Maisie discovers that both she and Eddie (the dead guy, who had developmental delays) "walked a narrow path" in life, meaning that they are uncomfortable with change. Maisie also comes to realize that she can't fix everything that goes wrong in other people's lives just because she has the money to do it, which I think is an important lesson for her, because she spent so much of the last book micromanaging everyone with her newfound wealth. 

I'm always curious about the degree that the author's worldview influences characters. For example, I married young and have had a very fulfilling family life, so my life experience has taught me that marriage and family are desirable objectives. It seemed in previous novels that Winspear might be steering Maisie toward marriage and family before her biological clock (which never ticks audibly) would run out. But in this novel, James is such a ninny-- he was so sweet in the previous books, and while I'm all for real, complicated love with real, complicated people, it seems apparent that Winspear doesn't seem to be steering Maisie and James down the path of marriage and kids sliding down the banisters at the Dower House. I wonder how much of this is Winspear's own life experience-- does she think that it would be inconceivable for a woman to balance a fulfilling career and a family in the 1930s? If anyone could do it, Maisie could, it just seems that she might not want to.

Book Review: Bloodborne by Gregg Luke (Whitney Finalist)

Title: Bloodborne
Author: Gregg Luke
Enjoyment Rating: 6/10
Referral: Whitney Finalist
Source: Electronic copy
Books I've read this year: 56

If you like the drama of Dan Brown (to whom Luke gives an over shout-out in the book), combined with the medical knowledge of Michael Crichton, and the suspense of Dean Koontz (who is also alluded to in the book), I think you get what Luke attempts to achieve in Bloodborne (minus any implausible romances, if I'm reading correctly that the final pages are motivated by duty/friendship instead of romance budding among the mosquitoes).

In the opening pages of Bloodborne, someone opens fire at a deli and tries to kill Dr. Erin Cross, a scientific researcher at a Lehi, Utah lab, working on vaccines for H1N1 and malaria, among other things. Within pages, someone else tries to kill her, then a co-worker gets killed and she discovers someone creeping around her house. She flees, and turns to the only person who she thinks might be able to help her, Sean Flannery, a  former special ops Marine who she met earlier at the deli. They run off to the Dixie National Forest, where Erin soon learns that Sean has a host of his own problems. Meanwhile, evil scientific researchers are unleashing deadly mosquitoes on a small Hawaiian island, testing out their new biological weapon, which will make them rich and powerful, if they can only get rid of Dr. Cross. Eventually, the two stories come together, and Cross can only avert disaster if she places her trust in the right people.

While the writing is fairly clean and the story moves quickly, it feels SO derivative.  I enjoyed Dr. Cross's character, but most of the other characters either felt wooden or problematic. This is a book to take at face value, but not one that seems to reward a deeper reading.

Assimilation

On Saturday, Rose went to her first gathering of the entire Miner clan-- both of Ed's brothers were in town, so we all got together for the first time in more than six years (so it was actually Maren's first gathering of the whole family as well). And what do you do when you have the whole family together? Take pictures, of course. We didn't hire a photographer because we weren't 100% sure Ed would make it until he walked though the door halfway through the party (those pesky heart attacks), and one certain member of the family has forbidden me from posting any pictures of him, but here's what we got of our immediate family:


Rose looks pretty darn cute right in the middle, doesn't she? Many thanks to Blue for sacrificing her Saturday afternoon and coming to snap a few shots.

I think I had some idea that after Rose joined our family we'd start shopping at the Chinese grocery store in Sandy and chopsticks would grace our dinner table. But we haven't done much adapting. Rose, however, has done lots of adapting. To the ever-present car seat, to the heavy-duty lotion rubdown every night, to being pushed around the house in Maren's dolly stroller. She's taken most of it in stride (although she didn't like it when Maren dumped her out onto the bathroom floor). But she really digs this:


Her first McDonalds cheeseburger. She are almost the whole thing-- mustard and all!

Here is one last look at my precious, drooly-faced baby standing at her new play table. She thinks she can stand all on her own, but we've had a few mishaps when we let go for a second. Take a close look at this sweet face, because in my next update she'll probably be markedly less cheerful, but her upper lip will be all in one piece! Surgery on Monday! Cross your fingers and say your prayers that everything goes well.


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